The Social Innovation for Resilient Communities (SIRCle) project uses adult education to address one of the most pressing needs of our time - how to marry our love for the planet with our capacity to make a living. An Erasmus+ funded strategic partnership, it involved a diversity of social enterprises, NGOs, cooperatives and academic institutions from Austria (Plenum/Pioneers of Change), Belgium (AEIDL and Still Consulting), Romania (Asociatia Romania in Transizie), Scotland (GEN and the … Read more
Social
Bringing new Solutions to the Table Conversations with the Commonwealth
Albert Bates, founding member of The Farm, Tennessee, was part of the GEN delegation at the Climate Summit in Marrakech, this November. He is also part of a group of sustainability experts brought together by the Secretary General of the British Commonwealth, Baroness Patricia Scotland. At the final day of the 22nd Conference of Parties to the UN Convention on Climate Change, Baroness Patricia Scotland rose to address the Joint High-level Segment gathered in plenary session: "Mr. … Read more
Ecovillage Movement in China An update on the Sunshine Ecovillage Network
The partnership and friendship between GEN and the Sunshine Ecovillage Network (SEN), in China has been growing in the past year, since the first Ecovillage Forum organised by SEN took place in October 2015, drawing around 500 interested participants. Ecovillage Design Education courses have previously been run in China, led by Pracha Hatanuwatr and Jane Rasbash, and many young Chinese have participated in ecovillage training elsewhere. Chinese representatives have been reaching out to GENOA – … Read more
African Response to Climate Change The Pan-African Ecovillage Development Programme: building resiliency and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals
The Pan-African Ecovillage Development Programme: building resiliency and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. By Tim Clarke, former EU Ambassador, advisor of the Global Ecovillage Network (GEN), who was a GEN delegate at the COP 22 Climate Conference in Marrakech. For the past 20 years, GEN has been developing a transformative model using an integrated, multi-sectoral community-based approach to create sustainable and resilient ecovillage communities. Africa is the home of some of … Read more
Europe (GEN Europe): Holistic Water Management and Water Retention Landscapes
Solution provided by Tamera, Portugal Humus and topsoil can absorb a large amount of water and release it slowly. In this way floods and droughts are prevented. But erosion has widely degraded both humus and topsoil in the landscape. In order to restore the water cycle, we need to enable rainwater to be absorbed by the earth even without the topsoil layer. Water Retention Landscapes are systems for the restoration of the full water cycle by retaining the water in the areas where the rain … Read more
Synergies between Degrowth and GEN Synergies between Degrowth and the Global Ecovillage Network
One of the most controversially discussed key tracks during the 5th International Degrowth Conference 2016 in Budapest was “Degrowth and other social movements”. Can degrowth be considered a movement? Does degrowth embrace all kinds of movements struggling for a sustainable future? On one hand, the notion of “degrowth movement(s)” was rigorously criticized for fragmenting the political struggle. It was also critiqued as umbrella concept for creating incongruous hierarchical relations between … Read more
Youth Ecovillage Design Education December 4th 2016 to January 8th 2017 in Auroville, India
The focus of the course: Discover the cultural heritage and richness of the Indian subcontinent. Experience one of the world’s largest & oldest Intentional Communities. Immerse in Pitchandikulam Forest as a host site with over 40 years of experience in Restoration Ecology and Integral Rural Development. Engage in personal self-exploration and worldviews by examining our connection to self and place. Investigate ecological experiments in Water Retention, Agro Forestry, … Read more
Tamera’s first LGBTQ Intro Week Report from Tamera's first LGBTQ Introduction Week
“Queerness is that thing that lets us feel that this world is not enough – the rejection of a here and now and an insistence on potentiality or concrete possibility of another world.” ~ Jose Esteban Munoz by Dara Silverman Tamera Healing Biotope's first LGBTQ Introduction Week coincidentally began on the same day as the massacre which claimed nearly 50 lives in a gay club in Orlando, Florida and concluded on the day of the Pride Parade in Lisbon - an unforeseen timing, which embedded … Read more
